But I didn't swear once: Gordon Ramsay tempers his temper for MasterChef Junior

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Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay, he of the four-letter-word fame, managed to keep his cussing under wraps for the filming of the US's first MasterChef Junior, to be aired on Fox at the end of September.

“I don’t think I swore once across two months,” he said at the Television Critics Association press tour in the US yesterday. The young contestants, however, revealed that Ramsay was not totally wrath-free during the experience - but it was never directed at them.

Competitor Dara from California said: “I think he got kind of frustrated with some of the waiters, but it wasn’t towards us, it was never towards us.”

The show is due to hit American screens next month and will see the young chefs eliminated in the same way the adults are in MasterChef.

Ramsay insists the pressure is a healthy thing, saying: “I’m brutally honest. I get straight to the point, and the kids, I think, welcome that.”

In the show, Ramsay teams up with restaurateur Joe Bastianich and chef Graham Elliot. Twenty-four cooks aged between eight and 13 compete in the first round and then split up into three groups of eight to create seafood, pasta or dessert dishes. The most successful earn a white MasterChef Junior apron and go on to the next round.

The finalists compete in a series of challenges and cook-offs, including a cupcake challenge, a tag-team Beef Wellington challenge and the restaurant takeover, during which they prepare a three-course menu at a restaurant in Los Angeles. Eventually one of them is anointed America’s first-ever MasterChef Junior. Oh, and they win $100,000.